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Carolinas HealthCare System Gets ‘Personal’ with Virtual Contact Center from Nortel


WEBWIRE

Healthcare Solution Connects Patient Calls with People, Not Recordings

CHARLOTTE, N.C. – The third largest public healthcare system in the United States doesn’t let size stand in the way of personalized care. For Carolinas HealthCare System **, the very best personal care begins with a virtual contact center from Nortel* [NYSE/TSX: NT ] that directs each patient call to a person, not a recording.

Carolinas HealthCare System has deployed a Nortel VoIP solution over an existing, non-Nortel data network to support six hospitals, 66 doctors’ offices and other medical facilities throughout the Carolinas Physicians Network **. This includes a virtual contact center with intelligent, skills-based routing to quickly connect callers to the person most qualified to immediately address their needs.

“We pride ourselves on delivering personalized patient care second to none,” said Daniel Wiens, senior vice president, Carolinas Physicians Network. “We believe the tone is set with the patient’s very first call, and in a medical situation, people will always be more comfortable dealing with a person. That’s why reaching a person right up front, rather than a recorded message, is so very important. Providing superior personalized service and fostering enduring patient relationships is one of our core strategies.”

“No environment is more critical than healthcare when it comes to making sure calls are handled promptly, efficiently and with personal care and attention,” said Dietmar Wendt , president, Global Services, Nortel. “We’ve designed a solution for Carolinas HealthCare with this absolute priority top of mind.”

With Nortel’s multimedia contact center solution for healthcare , Carolinas HealthCare System handles more than 640,000 callers a month. Calls are directed to one of more than 1,000 available home and office-based agents trained to provide the utmost care and attention to any medical question or situation.

This personal touch provides the highest possible levels of quality and safety. It has also improved patient retention and satisfaction. Carolinas Physicians Network has experienced a 31 percent improvement in patient satisfaction with telephone access since the Nortel VoIP system was implemented.

The virtual contact center has saved time and cost because it is more efficient and easier to manage than previous standalone key systems and small PBXs, which provided only basic automatic call distribution and no management reporting. Additional capital costs were avoided by using remote gateways – rather than more expensive IP PBXs – to deliver voice services to smaller locations, and by implementing the Nortel IP-based solution over an existing, non-Nortel data network.

Nortel’s healthcare solution for Carolinas HealthCare System includes Nortel Communication Server 1000 IP PBXs, Nortel Contact Center 6.0, Nortel Survivable Remote Gateways , Nortel Branch Office Media Gateways and Nortel IP phones and softphones .

Innovative healthcare solutions built on Unified Communications technology and Network Managed Services from Nortel are helping hospitals and other healthcare providers around the world to better serve their patients by saving critical time and enhancing productivity in an increasingly demanding environment.

Nortel Contact Center Services , part of Nortel’s Global Services portfolio, offer planning, design, implementation, integration, maintenance, optimization and certified program management throughout the lifecycle of a contact center to help businesses maximize competitive advantage while minimizing risk and cost.

About Carolinas HealthCare System

Carolinas HealthCare System ( www.carolinashealthcare.org **) is the largest healthcare system in the Carolinas, and the third largest public system in the nation. CHS owns, leases or manages 23 hospitals in North and South Carolina, including Levine Children’s Hospital in Charlotte and CMC-NorthEast in Concord, a 457-bed medical center which is home to the Jeff Gordon Children’s Hospital.

CHS employs over 1,000 physicians who practice in more than 275 locations. CHS also operates rehabilitation hospitals, nursing homes, ambulatory surgery centers, home health agencies, radiation therapy centers and physical therapy facilities. Together, these operations comprise over 4,900 licensed beds and employ more than 35,000 full-time or part-time employees.

CHS’s flagship facility is Carolinas Medical Center ( www.carolinasmedicalcenter.org **) in Charlotte, an 874-bed hospital which includes a Level I trauma center, a research institute and a large number of specialty treatment units (heart, cancer, organ transplant, behavioral health, etc.). CMC also serves as one of North Carolina’s five Academic Medical Center Teaching Hospitals, providing residency training for over 200 physicians in 15 specialties. CMC is listed as a “Best Hospital” by U.S. News & World Report for urology and orthopedics, and has been designated 10 times as Charlotte’s “Consumer’s Choice Preferred Hospital” by the National Research Corporation. HealthGrades, a leading healthcare ratings company, named CMC-NorthEast “The Best Hospital in North Carolina” for cardiac services.
Certain statements in this press release may contain words such as “could”, “expects”, “may”, “anticipates”, “believes”, “intends”, “estimates”, “targets”, “envisions”, “seeks” and other similar language and are considered forward-looking statements or information under applicable securities legislation. These statements are based on Nortel’s current expectations, estimates, forecasts and projections about the operating environment, economies and markets in which Nortel operates. These statements are subject to important assumptions, risks and uncertainties, which are difficult to predict and the actual outcome may be materially different from those contemplated in forward-looking statements. For additional information with respect to certain of these and other factors, see Nortel’s Annual Report on Form10-K, Quarterly Reports on Form 10-Q and other securities filings with the SEC. Unless otherwise required by applicable securities laws, Nortel disclaims any intention or obligation to update or revise any forward-looking statements, whether as a result of new information, future events or otherwise.

*Nortel, the Nortel logo and the Globemark are trademarks of Nortel Networks.
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